


wild horses, meet hollow bones

by a-bigail (spacepuck)



Category: Fruits Basket
Genre: Angst, Best Friends, Depression, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, but only a lil bit of angst u feel, kakeru helps in a Kakeru way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-14
Packaged: 2020-06-28 08:22:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19808422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacepuck/pseuds/a-bigail
Summary: Kakeru sighed, and squirmed again to shift his position so that he, too, sat sideways on the couch, half pigeon-posed and as close to Yuki as he could manage. He leaned an arm across Yuki’s knees, elbow and wrist to each cap, and said,“So?”“So, what?”“Tell me what’s up so that we can watch a movie? And eat snacks while we talk about how cool it is?”“Only you talk about how cool they are.“Yeah, but I know you agree with everything I say in the deepest corners of your heart.”Yuki scoffed briefly at that with a small smile tugging at a corner of his mouth, but as he shook his head the expression left him. Kakeru, in a rare moment of patience, waited for him to speak.--Something's up with Yuki. Kakeru stops by for a visit.





	wild horses, meet hollow bones

“Yuki! _Yuki!_ Lemme in!”

The banging at the front door of his apartment sent Yuki into a short panic, before easing into a familiar agitation as he registered the voice behind the noise. A low groan left him as he shifted off of the bed; his feet landed on forgotten clothes, and he stepped around the little obstacles he had left for himself in the wake of whatever had struck him earlier in the week. Something groggy and exhausted, null and strange, veiled his eyes when he woke Wednesday morning, and hadn’t left since. 

It was Saturday, which he only knew because Kakeru was pounding at his front door in the middle of the afternoon. 

(He glanced at the time on the microwave as he passed it. _Late afternoon_ , he corrected.)

Before he opened the door, he slid the chain lock in place. He wasn’t really in the mood for Kakeru to come by, and beyond that, wasn’t prepared for him. He felt disheveled. He _was_ disheveled, he knew, from the wrinkles in his shirt to the tangles in his unwashed hair. The apartment was more chaotic than usual, which, he worried, would further tip him off – not because it would necessarily bother him, but because it would bring on a slew of questions he didn’t want to answer, and wasn’t sure he even had the answers to.

So when he opened the door its allotted couple of inches, and Kakeru’s look of surprise only briefly interrupted what seemed, to Yuki, to be a look of mild concern, he knew he was already past the point of tipping him off. That didn’t assuage his thoughts any.

“Yun!” Kakeru pressed his hand flat on the door and pushed to let himself in, but the chain clacked taught. He stared at it, then at Yuki through the crack. “He-ey, what’s this – are you locking me out?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Why? I came to save you!”

“Save me? From what?”

“From yourself!” He pushed again, as though his answer were the magic words to unlock the door, and scoffed when the chain clacked again. “You’ve been listening to the same sad Mitski or whatever song for the past like, _five hours_.”

Yuki paused. How in the _world_ did he… 

He heard the music still wafting from his room, just quiet enough to barely perceive here at the door. His ears burned a little as he wondered if Kakeru could hear it.

“You still don’t know how to make your music listening private, huh, Yun-Yun. But that’s a good thing! Because with my superior detective skills, I was able to deduce that you’re–” He gave another shove at the door, grunting as he said, “–depressed!” 

“That’s…” Yuki felt his brows narrow. “I’m pretty sure that’s just called ‘stalking.’” 

“Nuh-uh!” he insisted. “Stalking would be if I, like, followed you around hiding behind newspapers that I wasn’t actually reading! And then came to your house unannounced to confess my undying love for you, even though you have no idea who I am.” 

Yuki hummed shortly, crossing his arms. “Hm. If that’s the case, then I’m afraid I have _no_ idea who you are. Guess I’ll just have to call the police.”

“ _Yun—_ ”

“And I’m not depressed.” Yuki shifted so his shoulder pressed against the doorframe. He reached up to brush his hair behind his ear as it tickled his face, and tried to ignore that it felt heavy and gross against his finger. “Maybe I just fell asleep and left it going.”

“‘Maybe?’ Wouldn’t you know?”

“If you’re such a detective, then figure it out yourself.”

“I’m detectiving right now! By asking the suspect questions!” 

“Oh, so I’m the suspect? Then I’m invoking my right to remain silent.” 

Kakeru tilted his head back to moan at the sky. 

“Yun-Yun,” he whined. “Just lemme in. Something’s up, I can tell.”

Yuki sighed. He looked back at his apartment, growing dim from the oncoming evening and the half-closed blinds. It was in a bit of a dismal state, even for him – he hadn’t lived in such a mess since he was fifteen and hiding out at his cousin’s home. Granted, this was better, but only marginally. 

“It’s kind of a mess,” he mumbled, to which Kakeru sputtered a small, incredulous laugh. 

“Yeah, and? You’re not exactly next to godliness.” 

A small sting hit Yuki at that, but he swept it away with a shake of his head and looked back at Kakeru.

“I’m just saying… I don’t know. Don’t make any weird comments.” 

“Weird comments?” Kakeru leaned in close to the crack in the door, suddenly looking conspiratory. Though he lowered his gaze somewhat, as though about to murmur a secret, he failed to lower his voice whatsoever. “ _Yuki,_ that sounds kind of—”

“Shut up. You know it’s not that.”

“Ugh, you’ve got dirty stuff in there _somewhere_. What young college man doesn’t! A bachelor living alone, in the height of his youth, miles away from his girlfriend—”

“I really am going to call the police.”

“So, you’re letting me in then?” he asked. When Yuki delayed, Kakeru hit the door open-palmed a few times. “C’mo-o-on.”

“Alright, alright, fine.” He took another long look at his apartment, tapping his fingers against his arm as he weighed his options, which, he admitted weren’t many. As he ran a hand through his hair, he relented. “Just… hold on.” 

He shut the door again to slide the chain lock off its track, but took in a slow breath first, resting his forehead against the jamb. He really, _really_ hadn’t planned on seeing anyone today. Something twisted in his belly at the thought of letting him in, and he swallowed back a sourness that crept up his throat.

 _If you didn’t want him to come in,_ he thought, _you should have ignored the door._

 _If you ignored him,_ another thought quickly followed, _he would have just broken it down thinking you were dead or something equally stupid. Either way, he’s yours to deal with now. Better let him in before he starts rioting._

He breathed out. When he slid the chain away from the door and put his hand on the knob, he felt it turn as Kakeru made his own way in. 

“ _Kakeru—_ ”

“Finally! Thanks for letting me in.” 

Yuki hardly had the time to step away as Kakeru tread inside. The urge to push him back out the door rang high in Yuki’s thoughts as his friend raised his arms to sidle by uncomfortably close, but as he kicked off his shoes and padded comfortably into the apartment, he knew it was too late.

Yuki shut the door behind him. He lingered a moment in the genkan before joining his friend, who had paused near the kitchen to survey the mess. It was the usual — trash, laundry, a smattering of school belongings — but dialed up somewhat. Some trash, somewhere, started to sour. That week's laundry had been tossed so carelessly it was hard to distinguish what was clean and what wasn't. Papers and forms and other school minutiae sat in limbo, between the realms of being important yet forgotten, and forgotten for good reason, all looking too similar to immediately identify into either camp. 

Kakeru whistled low. 

“Dang,” he said, “you weren’t joking. Huh.”

Something in that _huh_ made Yuki acutely self-conscious, and he found himself crossing his arms tight over his chest again. He said nothing. Just watched as the other boy surveyed the kitchen and living room, now somewhat unfamiliar, from where he stood in the space in between both rooms. 

“Huh,” he said again, but then shrugged and turned to face Yuki. “By the way, I brought snacks.” 

He held up a plastic bag that had gone unseen while he had been out on the doorstep. Yuki eyed it. 

“Oh, um. Thanks? You didn’t have to.”

“I did, though!” Kakeru came closer and unfolded one of Yuki’s arms away from him, forcing the bag into his unassuming hand. Yuki let him, having both found it easier not to resist these things, and not finding the energy to do so anyway. “I thought I might have to bribe you.” 

“That’s… wait, are these snacks for _you_ , or—”

“No, no, no, I got things for you. Mostly. I got those wafer cookie things you like.”

Yuki’s interest piqued at that. He didn’t bother telling him that if he had bribed him upfront, he might have let him in sooner. _Shouldn’t give him any ideas for the future._

As he rooted through the bag, Kakeru turned away from him again to walk into the living room. The living room, had, in truth, seen less of the impact from the past few days, as the brunt of the mess had occurred in his bedroom, where, in the rare quiet between them, he heard that same song end, then start again. 

From the other room, Kakeru exhaled another “huh.”

“So, Yun,” he called, before meeting Yuki again at where he stood still at the edge of the kitchen, “serious question?”

Yuki only looked at him. 

“What happened?” Kakeru lifted his arms to gesture at the kitchen, where the stack of dirty dishes in the sink and overflow on the countertops lingered as shadows at Yuki’s back. Before he could muster a response, Kakeru seemed to stiffen. “Wait.” Brows drawn, face turning serious, he asked, “Wait, Machi didn’t dump you, did she?”

“What? No.” Yuki sighed, turning to shove some things aside on the countertop to make room for the snacks. Something clattered, but didn’t break. “It’s nothing. I’ve just been busy.” 

“Busy-y-y not showering and crying in bed all day?” 

“I haven’t been _crying_.” 

“Well you sure as hell haven’t been _showering,_ either. You kind of smell like stale chips.”

As Yuki turned back to face him, face pinched in agitation, Kakeru’s hands landed suddenly on his shoulders. Though he expected to be shaken, maybe to rattle whatever thing had inched its way into his head out, Kakeru instead gave him a strangely intense stare. 

Yuki tried to distance himself by leaning away, but found himself against the counter. His head thunked thickly against a cabinet.

“Ow— Kakeru, what are you—”

“ _Shh_.”

He continued to stare, dark eyes squinting and hands tightening, and Yuki huffed a breath through his nose. He stayed compliant for a moment before breaking the silence, placing his hands on Kakeru’s shoulders in return and pushing him away a step.

“ _What_ are you doing?” he tried again.

Kakeru scoffed. He removed his hands from Yuki’s shoulders to instead raise them in frustration. “I was trying to send you a subliminal message!”

“A subliminal…” Yuki dropped his hands back to his sides. “Oh, my god.”

“It didn’t work because you didn’t let me _in_.”

“It didn’t work because you’re a moron.” Yuki sidestepped out of Kakeru’s range, walking away from him as he mumbled, “That’s not even how subliminal messages _work._ ”

“Subliminal messaging, telepathy, hypnotism, whatever.” Kakeru lowered his hands into his pockets and traipsed behind Yuki. “I was trying to tell you to like, take a shower or something and relax. Maybe take a laxative to get that constipated look off your face.” 

Yuki lengthened his strides. He wasn’t going anywhere in particular, and knew he couldn’t out-walk him inside the apartment, but something strange and upsetting fitted in his chest that made him feel the need to distance himself. Something stronger than annoyance tinged his voice as he asked, “Did you just come here to insult me?” 

“If it helps, yeah!” 

“It doesn’t.”

“Are you sure?” 

Yuki stopped in the living room, bracing his hands against the back of the couch. He stooped his head and screwed his eyes shut. 

_For some reason,_ he thought tiredly, aware that Kakeru was hovering rather close to him, _I feel like decking him._

“I’m sure,” he managed.

“Geez, are you okay?” He felt a hand land heavy on his back, and he tensed under it. “You’re not going to throw up or something, are you?”

Yuki didn’t respond. As he forced down a slow breath, he realized that there was, in fact, some underlying nauseous feeling making his insides hurt. That alone spiked his nerves even further – the times he experienced nausea had been few and far between, but when it came up…

Kakeru again put his hands on Yuki’s shoulders, this time from behind as he pulled him up to stand straight. As he started to guide him, Yuki stumbled somewhat, saying,

“Kakeru, I’m fine, I’m not going to—”

“C’mon, like I’m taking a chance on you ralphing all over the couch. That’s my spot.”

As Kakeru steered him to the bathroom down the hall, the mess grew, as a bundle of vines becomes thicker and increasingly impenetrable the closer one gets to the roots. His bedroom door was still open, the song still playing and becoming clearer, the room now dim and, Yuki thought, depressing to look at as he glanced at it. Kakeru didn’t seem to notice as he focused his efforts on kicking the bathroom door open hard enough for it to bounce off the wall and practically swing completely shut again. 

While Yuki tilted himself over the sink to press cold water onto his face, Kakeru disappeared with the vague promise of returning. He forced down another breath, wetly through his nose and back into his palms through his mouth. Why he had felt that heavy flutter of panic rise in his chest, he didn’t know. Nothing in particular had set him off. Kakeru had just been acting like Kakeru — and yet, he thought, his presence felt so suddenly _pervasive_ , as though he were intruding, disrupting some careful and compressed thing. 

_As if he’d walked into a tripwire,_ he thought, only to then think, _He’s been making me sit through too many spy movies._

By the time Kakeru returned with a bundle of unmatching yet supposedly clean clothes tucked under his arm, Yuki had already dried off his face. The nauseous feeling still swirled somewhere low in his stomach, but didn’t seem as though it would try to surface. He caught his friend’s reflection in the mirror and raised a brow at him.

“What are you doing?”

“Giving you clean clothes, duh. I wasn’t joking about you smelling.” 

He dropped the clothes on top of the hamper lid, which gave an empty sort of sound that he made an amused noise at. Before he closed the bathroom door behind him, he said,

“I’ll take care of everything, Yun!”

It was hardly enough to make Yuki feel better. But, he figured, taking in his reflection, a shower might.

–

When he returned to the living room, Yuki found things slightly shifted around. Piles had been moved out of the way to clear an empty space between the couch and television. Things here and there looked somewhat put together, not clean, but maybe a child's attempt at organization. The mess that had been on top of the low coffee table had been replaced with just the plastic bag of snacks.

This shift had occurred in his bedroom, too. After his shower, when he had returned to his room to change into an outfit less contrasting than the one Kakeru had chosen, he noticed an immediate chill that sprung goosebumps over his still damp skin. The window had been opened. The bed had been sloppily made, but at least made at all. The song had been turned off. 

Yuki heard Kakeru reappear through the front door, where he again kicked off his sneakers and gave a small _hup_ noise as he jumped noisily into the apartment. When he caught Yuki’s eye, he seemed to startle, until he pouted.

“Yuki! I wasn’t ready for you yet!”

“What?”

The other boy heaved an exasperated sigh. “ _Well_ , I was going to get this place all tricked out for us to hang! You know, have the ultimate night of bromanship!” 

Yuki sputtered a little. _What the hell is he talking about now?_

“‘Tricked out’... ‘bromanship?’”

“Yeah, you know, to cure your depression! It would have wiped away those tears for good.”

“I’m not…” Yuki leaned his forehead into his hand, quelling the irritation. “Kakeru, how long did you think I would be in the shower for?”

“I don’t know, like, two hours? I thought you would just sit and cry for a while or something.”

Yuki shook his head. Despite himself, he felt a small laugh escape him. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Hey, am not! I was ready to make some calls and everything.”

“Calls?”

“Yeah, you know. Order some food, rent some strobe lights, get girls.”

Yuki stared at him. “Girls.”

“Okay, not girls. _Women._ ”

Kakeru planted his hands firmly on his sides, looking oddly proud at his plan. Yuki repeated the word quietly on his mouth. Then, having a crashing realization of what his friend meant, he fell stony, and reached out to yank at his ear.

“ _Ow!_ ”

“Idiot. That’s what _you_ want.” 

“Nuh-uh! These women know how to cure a man’s troubled soul!”

“The only trouble _I_ have is _you_.”

“Wha—? _Ow_ , hey, that’s mean!”

“It’s not mean if it’s the truth.”

“Okay, okay, fine! I won’t call anyone, lemme go!”

Yuki let go. As Kakeru rubbed his stinging ear with a hiss, Yuki sighed, turning away from him to look at the kitchen. He noticed, then, that the trash that had piled up had receded. The dishwasher door hung slightly ajar, and the sink was mostly emptied.

His shoulders drew a little.

“Uh, Kakeru… were you cleaning up?”

“Huh? Oh, well, yeah. It was getting kind of gnarly in here.”

Yuki felt his neck burn a little. He reached up to rub at it, catching his bent elbow with his free hand, and said,

“You didn’t have to do that. I would have taken care of it.”

“Eh, I don’t mind. Machi’s place still gets worse than this sometimes, you know. I’m just around to make sure you guys don’t get eaten by some crazy bacterial fungus or something. Although, that _would_ make a killer home horror movie.”

Kakeru stepped around him, back into the living room where Yuki heard him drop into the couch. Yuki looked at the kitchen again, then thought of the living room, his bedroom, all somewhat fixed, or at least some of the more daunting things mended. 

Though part of him was thankful, a more looming part of him felt something worse.

He followed Kakeru to the couch and sat beside him. Though Kakeru sprawled outward, slouched so his feet came under the table and his hair dragged on the back cushion, game controller loosely in hand as he looked for a movie to watch, Yuki opted to sit sideways. Back against the armrest, facing his friend as his bent knees served as a barrier between them. He took one of the throw pillows, somewhat flattened and worn-looking, and held it to his chest. 

Kakeru turned his head to look at him, and quizzically looked over his position. 

“Are you still upset?”

“Huh?” 

His friend gestured loosely at him, before squirming to sit up straight. The hair on the back of his head stuck up funny. 

“That’s the position of a man about to cry, Yun-Yun.” 

Yuki rolled his eyes, and straightened one of his legs to kick Kakeru’s thigh. 

“Is not.” 

“Ouch, is _too_.” He adjusted his position again to face Yuki more clearly. “You know what that position screams? It screams, ‘I don’t want to be vulnerable to my best friend, even though I know I can tell him anything. So instead, I’m going to keep my stupid secrets to myself and hide behind my dumb pillow to cry into when we’re in the middle of watching the sick-ass movie he picked out, because I’m too distracted with my sadness to pay attention to the fact that it’s _kind of_ badass, and when he quizzes me later about what happened, I’m not going to be able to answer anything right because I was too busy being sad, all because I didn’t tell him what was wrong to begin with. Because I'm Yuki, and I'm _stubborn_.’”

Yuki stared at him, and he stared back, as if daring to tell him he was wrong. He gaped for a moment, unable to tell him that he _was_ wrong, or that maybe he wasn’t, but even _he_ didn’t know what the matter was, so there was nothing to say. So instead, he offered silence in return. 

Kakeru sighed, and squirmed again to shift his position so that he, too, sat sideways on the couch, half pigeon-posed and as close to Yuki as he could manage. He leaned an arm across Yuki’s knees, elbow and wrist to each cap, and said,

“So?”

“So, what?” 

“Tell me what’s up so that we can watch a movie? And eat snacks while we talk about how cool it is?” 

“Only you talk about how cool they are.”

“Yeah, but I know you agree with everything I say in the deepest corners of your heart.”

Yuki scoffed briefly at that with a small smile tugging at a corner of his mouth, but as he shook his head the expression left him. Kakeru, in a rare moment of patience, waited for him to speak. 

For some time, Yuki did nothing but purse his lips gently in thought, rolling the words around in his mouth and searching for the right ones. He flexed a hand into the pillow slowly, eyes cast down at the floor as he tried to think of anything he could say other than a dismissive, yet true, “I don’t know.”

But, in the end, that was all he could come up with.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Honestly, I woke up like this one day and it’s just been…” He waved a hand vaguely, signifying the loose veil of this thing that had been shrouding his mind, before dropping it back down across the pillow to his chest. “...I don’t know. I guess I’ve just been tired.”

“‘One day?’ Since when?”

“Wednesday, I guess. I remember I had my calculus exam that day.”

Kakeru squinted. “And you just woke up feeling… weird?”

“Mhm.”

“Like you were sick?”

“No, more like…” He grasped at the feeling that still sat in him, sitting square under his sternum, but struggled to find words for it. “Empty, maybe? Or, not empty, but just… sad. But because of what, I have no idea.” 

He rolled his shoulders a little, feeling a little uncomfortable as he said it out loud. Kakeru hummed in thought.

“Maybe it was a bad dream?”

“Mm, I don’t know.” He remembered, then, the types of nightmares he usually had, and the sickening feeling that stung him after waking, and shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t remember it, though.”

“Nah, doesn’t matter.” Kakeru waved a dismissive hand. “Your brain still hangs onto those things, even if you can’t remember them. I woke up from a nightmare once that made me freak for an hour straight, but for the life of me I couldn’t remember what the hell it was about. It was just that bad feeling and nothing to tie it to.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah. So, I dunno. Maybe it was just a bad dream.”

“I guess.” Something, though, told Yuki that that wasn’t quite right. He sighed. “But it’s been days.”

“Hmm. Yeah, that’s kind of weird. Unless, you know.”

“Unless?”

“Unless you’re depressed.”

“I’m _not._ ” Kakeru gave him a look, and Yuki stubbornly returned one back. “I’m not. I don’t have a reason to be.”

“Depression takes no prisoners, Yun. Learned that in Psych 101. Besides, didn’t you once say your childhood was kind of rough?”

Yuki stiffened at that. _Too casual,_ he thought, and suddenly, he felt everything in him become defensive. He pressed himself further into the arm of the couch. “That’s—”

“Still not my business, yeah, I know, don’t worry.” Kakeru patted his knee to settle him. “I’m not asking you to tell me, I’m just saying…” He tousled his dark hair and paused, before saying, “That kind of stuff sticks around, you know?”

Yuki quieted. He averted his gaze to the television, now dim and idle. Kakeru fidgeted with his wristband, quieting, too, for a moment before continuing,

“Right, so once, when I was a kid, I got a C on a test, right? The first C I got basically ever. It was on… I dunno, algebra, I think. It doesn’t matter. Anyways, I studied for it, and knew it by heart, but when I sat down to take it… I don’t know, I decided I didn’t want to do it right. Teenage rebellion, or something like that.” 

Yuki looked at him. Kakeru shrugged lightly. 

“This was before the whole, like, exploding at my mom thing. But it was a start, right? So I do the test, thinking that I’m cool for not caring about some of the answers, but the moment I leave the classroom, I start to panic. Like, crying in the bathroom, the whole shebang. And I’m like that for almost a week straight until I get it back and see for myself that I fucked it up. And then I stall for _another_ week with my mom, lying to her and saying I haven’t gotten it back yet. Eventually, it almost seemed like I was off the hook. 

Until I come home one day and she kind of looks ready to flip, because she emailed the teacher and asked about it. And _boy_ , did she flip. But the weird thing is, I don’t remember a single word she said to me. What I _do_ remember is that, afterward, after all the yelling and crap had died down, she dropped this really heavy iron pot while she was making dinner.”

He paused, then, to scratch as the back of his head. Yuki was silent.

“I’m not scared of loud noises,” he continued, “or yelling, or anything like that. But every now and then, when I hear some really loud _thunking_ noise, like that pot made when it hit the floor?” He raised a finger, pointed at the ceiling, and made a circling motion with it. “I’m back to that whole two weeks of panicking. All over a lousy test, and all over a stupid pot.” 

Yuki swallowed thickly and looked down at his hands. Kakeru sighed, then pulled away to straighten his back, stretching his arms high overhead with a groan.

“ _So_ , that’s all I’m saying,” he said. “That really stupid stuff can come back and get you messed up. And maybe it was a dream, or maybe it happened when you were like, brushing your teeth or catching the bus. Something that’s never bothered you before now, that you don’t know how to put your finger on because it’s new. And it sounds stupid that it happens for no reason, but honestly, sometimes the world just decides to point a finger at you and say, ‘time to let this fuck this guy up for a few days,’ for no real reason other than that’s just how things go.”

Kakeru settled his hands behind him on the couch cushion, leaning back and going quiet once again. Yuki ran a fingernail across a row of stitches in the pillow, thinking.

“What do you do to get out of it?” he finally asked.

“Uh, _tell_ someone? Usually Komaki, because she knows.”

“Hm.”

“Which I guess is the first step you botched. You seriously didn’t tell anyone you were feeling weird?”

Yuki shook his head. “I didn’t exactly have anything to say.”

“O- _kay_ , but it’s still good to just let someone know that _something’s_ up, even if you don’t know what it is.”

“That’s a waste of time,” Yuki muttered. He reached up to scrub at an eye with the heel of his palm. “All I’d do is worry them unnecessarily. What good does that do?” 

“Well, I dunno. Maybe nothing at first, but it’s good to let people in the loop, you know? So they can check in on you without surprising you, and so they don’t have to investigate because they happened to catch you listening to the same sad song over and over again?”

Yuki stared at him again. “I still don’t get how you do that.”

“I follow your music activity,” he said easily. “It’s fun seeing what stuff you’re into.”

“I don’t… okay.” 

Yuki slid a hand over his hair, still damp but at least clean. He looked again at the idle television, before drawing his eyes down to the square of carpet Kakeru had unearthed. He hadn't seen it in days. 

“I just don’t like bothering people like that, if I don’t need to,” he said softly. “If this thing is going to pass on its own, whatever it is, then—”

“That’s stupid,” Kakeru interrupted. Yuki brought his stare back to his friend. “Like, yeah, a cold will pass on its own too, but it’s nice to have help, right? Someone to keep you company, or ask how you’re doing?”

“But this isn’t a cold. This is something, I don’t know, _different?"_ An agitation crept into his voice, and he felt his face pinch as his limbs grew stiff. "Like,I’m not going to call Machi during midterms and worry her over this weird thing that no one can do anything—”

“Oh, is that what it is?”

“Is that what _what_ is?”

“You think people are too busy to deal with you?”

Yuki stopped. Kakeru shook his head, _tsk_ ing him and reaching forward to jostle his knee.

“Geez, Yuki, you’re really something else." Though he sounded nonchalant, Yuki noticed something faintly forlorn behind his friend's eyes. Something upsetting twisted in him, but Kakeru continued undeterred. "You need to stop thinking that your problems are too much for people to handle, or that people don’t have time for you. Because, yeah, even if they _are_ busy, at least they know what’s going on with you, and can maybe help you when they can. Seriously, you’re not as much of a bother as you think you are.” 

His hand left Yuki’s knee, and Yuki’s brows furrowed. Everything in him wanted to reject what Kakeru was saying. This was _his_ problem to deal with, not anyone else’s. Not Kakeru’s, not Machi’s, not Ayame’s, not Tohru’s. It was _his_ job to make sure that whatever this was didn’t become some outstanding problem for someone else to handle. For it to leave him would be to contaminate everyone else.

 _And so, what_ , he wondered to himself, _you let it contaminate yourself instead, from the inside out? Then what happens?_

He didn’t have an answer for himself. He held the throw pillow tighter to him, and wondered. 

Meanwhile, as he thought to himself, Kakeru shimmied himself into his previous position, picking up the controller again and making the screen turn bright as he jostled the analog stick. He sank down until he was once again halfway off the couch and sighed contentedly.

“Well hey, you got a free pass this time, right? Since I came to check on you first. So now I know something’s up, and you don’t have to do your weird hide and seek thing anymore.” 

Yuki hummed, but it was stilted as it left him. He felt, suddenly, a little lighter in his ribs, and when he exhaled his next breath he felt some of the tension wound up tight along his bones leave him. He slouched further into the couch; in the safety behind his legs, still bent, momentarily blocking Kakeru from his sight, he felt that strange conflict tense in him, before it trailed away. As water drains off a street after a storm, as a child goes down a slide, into their parent’s expectant arms at the end.

He didn’t mean to, but he let his eyes grow teary into the top edge of the pillow.

“What do you feel like?” Kakeru asked, and the screen flickered in the corner of Yuki’s blurring vision as Kakeru pressed against the analog stick with a repeating _click_. “A bunch of western guys killing each other, Keeanu Reeves killing everyone else, or a ghost trying to kill a bunch of people moving into an old ugly house?” 

Yuki tried to surreptitiously sniff the wetness in his nose back up, raising a hand to swipe at the undersides of his eyes. Kakeru paused, and seemed to shift his head to look in Yuki’s direction. 

“I get it,” he said gently. He cleared his throat, and the screen flickered blearily in the corner of Yuki's vision. “Women it is.”

“ _Kakeru,_ ” he scolded wetly, and he kicked his leg again. Kakeru yelped, and when he complained, Yuki felt himself laugh. And then he laughed again, louder, uglier, and he tried to simultaneously cover the smile behind the back of his hand and the tears behind his fingers. Such a happy noise, mingling with a sadness that coiled around his throat like a rune. 

And Kakeru laughed, too.

**Author's Note:**

> did i expect to write over 5k words about these idiots? no. but i'm glad i did. 
> 
> the working title for this was "listen to crack baby by mitski too many times and your best friend might come over to investigate," but i figured that would be a little too long-winded. that said, the title is inspired by [crack baby by mitski](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edEO9Ldb_VQ). 
> 
> hmu @ yunsoh.tumblr.com


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